


The lamb walked into the lion's den

by Aethelar



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: (in an indeterminate twelfth to eighteenth century sort of way), Alternate Universe - Historical, M/M, Monk!Newt, vampire!Graves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-20
Updated: 2020-04-20
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:21:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23752258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aethelar/pseuds/Aethelar
Summary: And the lion said: "For someone so keen on truth, you have a lot of misconceptions about me. Perhaps I should correct them; if you're staying, you should know who you're staying with."
Relationships: Original Percival Graves/Newt Scamander
Comments: 7
Kudos: 104





	The lamb walked into the lion's den

**Author's Note:**

> For an ask on tumblr that requested a "proper old-fashioned gothic vampire story"

The ruins are dark.

It sounds cliched to say it, like the opening to a bad horror story, but - it’s true.

Newt is in the old castle ruins, and the ruins are dark.

He shifts his grip on the candle in his hand, freeing up two fingers to clutch at the crucifix round his neck. It brings the flickering flame uncomfortably close to his chin, but he needs the reassurance. His other hand is weighed down by the heavy, oversized bible he carries, held shut with iron clasps to keep anything touched by evil from reading it. The cross etched in the cover is inlaid with silver and Newt holds it facing out like a shield.

“The Lord is my shepherd,” he reminds himself. “I shall not want.”

“Shall you not?” a smooth voice asks. Newt spins towards it but he can’t see anything beyond his circle of candlelight. “Doesn’t seem a very good shepherd, if he allows his sheep to wander here.”

Newt swallows. “I will fear no evil! For thou art with me, thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me!”

The voice snorts, an inelegant sound somehow made sinister in the way it echoes off the worn stone. “Oh, I _bet_ they do.”

Newt falters in confusion for a second, then his ears burn in realisation. “You can’t say that about _God!_ ”

“Why not?” the voice asks, this time from behind him. Newt spins to keep facing it, lifting his candle higher in a futile effort to try and see. “He’s already cursed me, what else can he do?”

“No, that’s not - that’s not how God works, you can’t -”

“I didn’t curse myself,” the voice hisses, and Newt is sharply reminded that it’s not a man, this thing he’s talking to. Not anymore, and he can’t allow himself to think of it as one. “Your loving shepherd chose for me to become what I am. Seems a bit rich for him to blame me for it, doesn’t it?”

“He _is_ loving,” Newt protests, then continues, stronger: “And he didn’t chose you to be, to be _evil,_ he’s good, that’s the whole _point_ of him.” He brandishes the bible, taking a step forward in annoyance. “You’re twisting words. You’re trying to trick me!”

“What would be the point? I’ve met your kind before, little sheep. You’re not interested in truth.”

“Of course I’m interested in truth,” Newt says, fear fading into his growing frustration. He steps forward again, and thinks he sees the trailing hem of the other’s long cloak as they step back out of the light. “That’s what I do, I learn things and I write them down and I teach them to people so that eventually everyone knows the truth. Would you _please_ stop walking away? It’s very rude.”

He’s all but trotting at this point, awkwardly shielding the candle so it doesn’t blow out. He’s not prepared for the figure in front of him to stop suddenly and has to scramble back to avoid walking into them.

“I’m rude?” the voice snarls, startling close behind him, and Newt nearly trips as he spins round. There’s nothing there though, just black, and when the voice continues it seems to echo from all sides of him at once. “You come to kill me, and I’m _rude?_ ”

The black, Newt notices with a sinking feeling, is solid in every direction. He doesn’t even have the vague outlines of windows to tell him which way he’s facing. He’s not sure he could find his way out. “You murdered people,” he says, trying to keep his voice level. “In the town, they told me. I have to stop you. And besides, I’m not _killing_ you.” His voice cracks, and his throat seems too dry. He licks his lips to wet them, but it doesn’t help. “I’m freeing you. Your soul. It… I, um, cleanse it of evil and it goes to heaven.”

There’s a long pause. Newt strains his eyes, but it’s still futile. He hopes the creature can’t hear his heartbeat, because it’s deafeningly loud to Newt.

“Poor little lamb,” the voice finally says. It sounds vaguely amused, slinking around Newt in a lazy circle. “What on earth were you trying to teach them?”

It’s a non sequitur, but Newt answers anyway. “The truth. That we are all of God’s creation, that salvation is freely offered if only we accept it, that if we are to love the Lord we must first love what he has made -”

“That we are all equal and all worth the same salvation?” Definitely amused now, there’s no doubting it, and Newt bristles at the mocking.

“We are,” he protests. “I know what some people are saying but I’ve _read_ everything, and it says wealth doesn’t matter so I don’t understand why everyone pretends you can buy your way out of purgatory because as far as I can see you love your neighbour a lot more if you _feed_ them with that money -”

“So you taught them to ask for more and their masters sent you to me. Did they also tell you to come at night, or was that more of your learning?”

The implication is impossible to miss, and Newt wonders with a vague sense of terror if it’s supposed to be a threat. If it is, it’s a bitter one, but that somehow makes it worse; like the creature is fully aware he’s being used as an executioner, but is already resigned to it happening. Newt stays rooted in place - there’s no point turning, but it’s intensely unsettling to know that there’s someone circling around him like this. “You have to be awake for the ritual,” he says, and he hates how unsure he sounds. He tucks his arms around himself and reaches for his crucifix again. It’s on a silver chain, and even if the cross doesn’t keep the creature back - which it will, it has to - the silver is a comforting barrier to have over his neck. “You can’t attack me,” he continues, steadier. “I’m a monk. God will protect me.”

“Will he,” the creature asks, and between one racing heartbeat and the next he’s standing in front of Newt, close enough to almost touch. Newt stumbles back but the man - _creature_ \- merely raises an eyebrow and doesn’t move. He’s slightly shorter than Newt, but clearly stronger, and even in the orange light of the candle his skin is unnaturally pale. His eyes, Newt is horrified to note, are a dark shade of red, and though there’s nothing so crass as a fang showing at the edge of his amused smirk, Newt knows his teeth will be far longer than any human’s.

“Here I am, little sheep,” the vampire says. “Awake and not attacking you. Aren’t you going to save my soul?”

It’s a trap. It feels like a trap. It _has_ to be a trap, but the vampire just stands there, waiting. He’s so still he looks unreal, all his edges too sharp, like Newt would cut himself if he got too close.

“You’ll die,” he says, less as a warning and more to make sure the vampire won’t change his mind and rip Newt’s throat out half way through. “Your soul is purified and your body returns to ash, and you die. And - and there’s an afterlife, it’s not an _end_ death, but. You die.”

“So you say,” the vampire agrees, and that doesn’t _exactly_ sound like informed consent but Newt came here to do a job and he’s going to do it. He balances the bible against his wrist, fumbling with the iron clasps to open it. He holds the candle awkwardly in the same hand, then fetches amethyst and anise from his pocket, along with a small bunch of wormwood. He places them around the vampire in a rough triangle and, after a second’s hesitation, unloops the crucifix from around his neck to wrap around the amethyst. He makes this the head of the triangle, sitting between him and the vampire as an extra level of protection.

“For purification,” he explains, answering the unasked question. “And for peace for the dead. It’s not in the book, I know, but knowledge is still knowledge and I couldn’t see why it _wouldn’t_ be true, so.”

“So you learnt it and you wrote it down and you tried to teach it,” the vampire finishes for him. He laughs, a soft sound that’s more an amused huff than anything else. “Maybe I was wrong when I said I’d met your kind before.”

There doesn’t seem to be much Newt can say to that - the idea that the vampire’s met other monks is worrying, because despite how oddly obliging he’s being now Newt can’t believe that the other meetings ended well. The vampire is, after all, a murderer, and no monk would just walk away from an evil creature terrorising a local town.

He turns instead to his bible. “Deus,” he begins, angling the candle to read the words without dripping wax on them. “Deus meus, respice in me…”

The rhythmic latin is soothing, and Newt loses himself in the familiar rise and fall. He’s aware, in a vague, distant sense, of the vampire’s barely suppressed snarl, the way the candle seems incrementally brighter, the comfort and confidence he feels; he notices when the vampire is forced to one knee, lips pulled back in a growl and claws digging in the dirt for grip. He feels disconnected from it, as though the words are the only thing that matters, and he’s not sure he could stop the measured cadence from spilling out even if he wanted to.

“In conspectu ejus cadent,” he finishes, “omnes qui descendunt in terram.”

The candle flares, then dies so low Newt can barely see. He blinks to adjust his eyes, looking down at the vampire to see if it worked. His head is bowed and he’s statue-still and unmoving.

Newt hesitates. Should he… ask? If the vampire’s ok? Is the body meant to still be there when the soul is gone, isn’t it meant to be ashes?

“The lamb has bite,” the vampire says, breaking into Newt’s thoughts. He looks up, eyes now a burning crimson and open mouth clearly showing his fangs. “But there’s something you missed in your research.” He stands slowly, keeping eye contact with Newt the whole way, and grabs the amethyst in an almost lazy move.

Newt pales, his hand going to his throat. His crucifix. It was wrapped round the amethyst.

“You can’t save a vampire’s soul,” the vampire says, letting the amethyst roll carelessly out his fingers and leaving the crucifix in his palm. “Because vampires don’t have souls.” He closes his hand. When he opens it, the heavy silver cross is a misshapen lump with indents to match his claws, and the chain is a tangled, half-melted mess.

Newt takes a step back, then another, then turns and runs. He can’t remember which way he came in but it’s panic driving him forward, not reason. He can’t see far enough ahead to properly anticipate the walls and he nearly runs straight into one, skidding into a turn at the last second and dropping the bible as he flings a hand out for balance. He goes to push himself off again and keep running when the vampire slams him back against the wall, grip punishingly tight on Newt’s shoulder.

“Let me go,” he gasps, trying to slip out.

“Go where?” the vampire asks. “Deeper into the castle? You won’t find anything there. Back to the town that’s already tried to kill you? Hardly seems like a good idea.”

“They didn’t try to kill me,” Newt says, kicking out viciously at the vampire’s ankle. The hands holding his shoulders down disappear and for a second he thinks he’s free, then the vampire grips his thighs and lifts him up effortlessly to pin him against the wall. Newt squeaks, torn between fear and mortification at the new position.

“They sent you to a vampire at night, armed with a ritual that doesn’t work. You don’t even have a stake, a sword - nothing. If they weren’t trying to kill you then they were doing an awful job of keeping you alive.”

Newt shakes his head, pressing himself back against the wall to keep as much space between them as he can. “That doesn’t make sense, they need me to stop you because you keep murdering people.”

“I don’t, actually,” the vampire says, shifting his grip to hold Newt in place with his hip so he can use his hand to pin Newt’s wrists above his head. He tilts his head consideringly and Newt flushes an embarrassed red. “They murder each other and blame me when anyone starts asking questions. The only ones I kill are the ones that attack me, and that hasn’t happened for a while now.”

“But that - you’re a _vampire_ , killing people is what you do.” Newt moves to gesture with his hands but the grip around his wrists tightens in warning, and he tilts his head instead to illustrate his point. “You drink people’s blood and kill them and…” He trails off. The vampire’s gaze has zeroed in on his neck. He’s smirking again, amused, almost indulgent; he’s got Newt pinned in an _entirely_ too suggestive position he can’t fight back from, and Newt’s just reminded him that vampires kill people and then all but offered his neck in invitation.

He bites his lip to keep from saying anything more and hunches his shoulders protectively.

“For someone so keen on truth, you have a lot of misconceptions about me,” the vampire says. He leans forward, pressing his nose into the soft skin behind Newt’s ear, and Newt shivers at how cold it is. “Perhaps I should correct them,” he rumbles softly. “If you’re staying, you should know who you’re staying with.”

“Staying?” Newt squeaks. “I’m not staying, you can’t just keep me here!”

“And yet, it’d be highly irresponsible of me to let you leave. _Your_ shepherd might not care where you wander off to, little lamb, but you’ll find I’m not so negligent as him.” He draws back, but doesn’t relax his grip on Newt’s wrists. His other hand, balancing Newt’s thigh, is comparatively gentle; Newt can feel the faintest hint of claws catching on his clothes as the vampire traces a pattern with his fingers. “What’s your name?”

“Newt,” Newt answers on reflex. “I’m still not going to -”

“Newt,” the vampire cuts across him, eyes burning crimson and over-bright. Something tugs on Newt’s thoughts, but he shakes it off and the vampire frowns. “Stubborn,” he chides. “A nickname, perhaps? Could you be a Nathan, or something different altogether - no, simpler. Newton.” He smiles, and Newt stares, transfixed. “Newton,” the vampire repeats in a satisfied purr; it rolls through Newt’s mind like a fog, wrapping around him and leaving him boneless and pliant in the vampire’s hold.

“Doesn’t seem fair,” he says in a voice verging on breathless, “you knowing my name if I don’t know yours.” Distantly, he recognises the feeling of warmth creeping through him as the vampire’s thrall, but the only thing he can think of to fight it is to pray, and he’s forgotten the words.

“Very stubborn,” the vampire amends approvingly. “But not particularly subtle. My name is my secret, but you can call me… Graves. Now, Newton. Sleep.”

What kind of a name is Graves, Newt thinks, and in a flash of inspiration he remembers: _Pater noster, qui es in caelis -_

The thrall makes his limbs heavy and his thoughts sweet and slow like honey. He feels Graves rearrange him into a bridal carry and makes a soft noise in protest.

“Sleep,” Graves insists, and despite himself, Newt sleeps.


End file.
